Ask the Tweeps?

A knowledge worker in search of information or answers to specific issues or problems has several possible alternatives at their disposal to attempt to find the right answers, and solve their problem.Flickr - Thomas Hawk

Options:

1. Ask an internal colleague

2. Search the available company information databases or systems

3. 'Broadcast' a question to numerous other internal colleagues, or even the entire company

4. Google it

5. Leverage 'external' contacts, via e-mail, phone, or social networking

Lately, it seems like more and more I am turning to my 'external' networks, usually my Twitter friends, when I have a question, issue, or am looking for some opinion and feedback on issues that are not 'inside' in nature.

My question to you is : Who do you turn to when you are in need of information, or insight?

Do you find yourself asking your Twitter, Facebook, or other 'external' contacts more or less than your co-workers?

Are your 'external' contacts more important and vital to your success than your co-workers?

And finally, what should organizations be doing (if anything), if indeed many employees are relying on external contacts and social networks for answers and information?

Let me know your thoughts.

Carnival of HR - Oasis Edition

The latest Carnival of HR is up at Rowan Manahan's excellent Fortify Your Oasis blog, and I am extemely pleased to be included and batting leadoff!

In addition to my contribution, you will find posts from some of my personal favorites Meg Bear from Talented Apps, Lisa Rosendahl from HR Thoughts, and Jon Ingham from Strategic HCM, as well as many, many other excellent writers.

Thanks very much Rowan for organizing the Carnival, and for including my offering with such a fantastic collection.

Enjoy!

Technology Quiz -What Platform am I talking about?

Here is a Technology quiz for a Wednesday - Name That Platform.

Some background - this platform can be considered very similar to an employee information portal, where a user logs in, and is presented with a combination of user-specific and tailored content as well as 'organizational' content and information.

Here are some of the key features:

Extremely easy to use - in fact inexperienced users often learn all the necessary functions with no 'formal' training, and only occasional reference to the available online help.

Cool User Interface - one or two click access to all the most important and commonly used functions, layout is intuitive, and consistent. Users can efficiently conduct a wide range of transactions and processes in just a couple of steps.

Interactive elements - animated 'guides' are utilized to describe certain platform features, and provide extra help and assistance. These 'guides' help the user navigate some of the newly introduced features of the platform.

Educational Content - interactive learning, quizzes, and tons of information on a wide variety of topics, rewards for completing educational modules built right in to the platform

Staff Profiles - quick access to detailed profile information on your network, with pictures, their current status, and links to connect with them in numerous ways

Connection to other users - embedded chat, 'following' or 'friending' capability, and opportunities to interact with other users for mutual benefits.

Engaging - users of this platform consistently indicate the platform is fun, they get the information they need, and they actually enjoy working with it.

Lightweight - It is 100% deployed over the web, it supports hundreds of thousands of users all over the world, and while I do not have statistics, the uptime and reliability is first-class.

Okay, any ideas yet?

The information platform I am describing is Webkinz World.  If you are not familiar with Webkinz, they are small toy stuffed animals that come with a unique code that can be used to 'register' your Webkinz in the online interactive platform Webkinz World.

Once the user logs in to the platform, they 'manage' their pets (think employees) they can take online quizzes (educational content), interact with other users (internal social networking), and review and optionally respond to Webkinz messages (intranet, or information portal).

Home Page - A nice information portal welcome page, a little busy maybe (we are dealing with a target user between 6 to 9 years old).  News from the company in the center and right, and links to the user specific information along the bottom menu bar.  Note the large 'Things To Do' button on the lower right which opens up a menu of all the actions the user can take from here.

Here is the 'Things To Do' menu.  All the important options, information, and functions can be launched  from this menu.

Think about many corporate systems and portals that require the user to navigate through a byzantine menu structure to find the correct link to launch the desired function. In Webkinz World, launching the desired function is typically never more that two clicks away.

And these functions are grouped nicely into various categories according to their use and even include some colorful icons to help describe the function (potentially a good idea if you have users that may not have English as their native language).

The last cool feature of Webkinz World that I think has parallels to many of the newer HR portals and Talent Management Systems is the Profile Page. In Webkinz World, the 'profile' page displays to the user information on each of their registered pets, in the corporate systems environment this kind of profile page would potentially display your direct reports, your project team members, or the search results from some kind of an expertise query.

Profile Page

Here is the main profile page, think of a page like this one displaying rich employee profile information instead of some of my son's 'pets'.

At a glance the profiles show information on pet 'happiness, health, and hunger', perhaps in a corporate environment these could be 'availability, performance review score, or recommendations'. Clicking on your 'pet', launches yet more information and the ability to interact. In Webkinz this may be feeding or playing a game, in the corporate environment this could be an IM, e-mail, or request for a video chat. More details of the employee's past assignments or projects can be captured, to facilitate staffing of new projects or initiatives.

Conclusion

What can we learn from all this? The layout, design, and user experience of an informational and interactive portal aimed at 7 year olds does have some applicability to the HR portals and systems you use today, or may be interested in using in the future. I mean, if the system can be 'learned' by little kids, with no help or training, provides a wealth of information, functions, and is somewhat tailored to each user then why can't the portals and systems that we make available to our workforces have all those things?

If you have a child, grandchild, niece, nephew, etc. in the 6-10 demographic ask them if they can give you a demo of Webkinz World, you just might pick up some ideas you can use in your corporate HR systems.

Thanks to Patrick for giving me the demo!

I don't care what it says, who else has seen this?

One of my very first 'mentors' in the corporate world was the CFO of a rather large division of what then was AT&T. Whatever is left of that group today would likely be part of Alcatel-Lucent, although it is really impossible to say what became of the department.

Back in the day before ubiquitous e-mail, important information was circulated via the old-school written memo.  The memo was usually typed out by an administrative assistant, copied, and finally distributed to two 'lists' of people.  The 'To' list and the 'CC' list. Generally speaking, the folks on these lists would be the only people to see and read the contents of the memo.Flickr - mil.

Back to my CFO. Whenever a memo of any kind crossed his desk, he immediately glanced at the top of the first page, (where the 'To' list of names was), and then quickly paged to the end of the memo, (where the 'CC' list of names was).

Once I observed him doing this and asked why he instantly paged to the end of a particular 5 page memo and he replied,

'I need to know who else has this information, before I read it, and before I even think about making a decision about it'. 

He really meant it too.  His approach, strategy, and decision making process was heavily influenced by his perception of 'Who else knows this?'.  Back then, information could be controlled, e-mail was not universal, there was no wiki, blog, or Twitter to spread and share information.  To use the old cliche, knowledge was power, and in many cases it was hoarded and exploited for the wrong reasons.

That all seems like such a long time ago, and I would like to think in the modern organization, supported by almost limitless media and technology to share and transmit information, that the 'Who else has seen this?' question is ridiculous and unimportant.

But I am not so sure.

I still think that the 1970's mindset of the closely guarded memo still endures in many organizations. I still sense that information, and access to those who have information is not as free and effortless as many of us would like to believe.

I hope that my organization, and yours, can get to the place where the answer to 'Who else has seen this?' is typically, 'Everyone'.

I hope that soon, even asking the question is ridiculous.

HR Happy Hour - Episode 2

The impromptu HR Happy Hour we did last Friday on Blog Talk Radio was so much fun and has inspired enough interest that we have set up HR Happy Hour - Episode 2, coming to you live at 6:00 PM EDT, on Friday June 5.

The special guests for Episode 2 are three of the best and coolest HR Bloggers I know:

Deidre Honner - The HR Maven - A key member of Job Angels, a HUGE hockey fan, and all-around great person

Shauna Moerke - HR Minion (Shauna was on HR Happy Hour Episode 1, but she is so cool she got invited back for Round 2)

Lisa Rosendahl - from HR Thoughts - one of the best HR Blogs around, a super-nice person, and notorious early-riser

To listen live to the show, or to access the show archive afterwards, go to Steve Boese on Blog Talk Radio.

To participate and ask a question of one of our superstar bloggers, call 646-378-1086 once the show starts.

Thanks is advance to the All-Star panel, and let's have some fun at HR Happy Hour!